[Palaeontology, Vol. 62, Part 2, 2019, pp. 225–253] A FISH AND TETRAPOD FAUNA FROM ROMER’S GAP PRESERVED IN SCOTTISH TOURNAISIAN FLOODPLAIN DEPOSITS by BENJAMIN K. A. OTOO1,5,* ,JENNIFERA.CLACK1,*, TIMOTHY R. SMITHSON1, CARYS E. BENNETT2, TIMOTHY I. KEARSEY3 and MICHAEL I. COATES4 1University Museum of Zoology Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EJ, UK;
[email protected],
[email protected] 2Department of Geology, University of Leicester, Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK;
[email protected] 3British Geological Survey, The Lyell Centre, Research Avenue South, Edinburgh, EH14 4AP, UK;
[email protected] 4Committee on Evolutionary Biology, University of Chicago, Culver Hall, 1025 East 57th Street, Chicago, IL 60637, USA;
[email protected] 5Current address: Committee on Evolutionary Biology, University of Chicago, Culver Hall, 1025 East 57th Street, Chicago, IL 60637, USA;
[email protected] *Corresponding authors Typescript received 15 December 2017; accepted in revised form 20 July 2018 Abstract: The end-Devonian mass extinction has been of which are currently endemic to the Ballagan Formation. framed as a turning point in vertebrate evolution, enabling There are two named tetrapods, Aytonerpeton and Diplo- the radiation of tetrapods, chondrichthyans and radus, with at least two others also represented. Gyracanths, actinopterygians. Until very recently ‘Romer’s Gap’ ren- holocephalans, and actinopterygian fishes are represented by dered the Early Carboniferous a black box standing rarer fossils. This material compares well with vertebrate between the Devonian and the later Carboniferous, but fossils from other Ballagan deposits. Faunal similarity analy- now new Tournaisian localities are filling this interval. sis using an updated dataset of Devonian–Carboniferous Recent work has recovered unexpected tetrapod and lung- (Givetian–Serpukhovian) sites corroborates a persistent fish diversity.